Loudness wars

If you wondered why old records tend to sound way much better than that new stuff that comes out you're right. This is partly to blame to mastering. The mastering engineers are instructed to crank up the sound as much as possible. And even beyond the limits. Resulting in horrendous sounding albums.

So if you like a band very much and you don't want to listen to a destroyed mix you can try to find the DVD or SACD of that band because that might contain a non squashed version of the music.

During mastering I use the system a very influential mastering engineer Bob Katz came up with. K-20, K-14 and K-12 are volume levels that can be used to determine how loud a track may sound.

K-20 for classical and other wide-range music.
K-14 for pop /rock/ dance.
K-12 for broadcasting levels.

So in a way I'm rebelling against what current mastering engineers are doing and it makes us disciples of Mr.Katz. And it seems that more people are starting to realize that loudness isn't improving the quality of sound.

Mastering room

I have a single mastering room. Equipped with custom build monitors. The mastering room is acoustically optimized to avoid unwanted reflections. The room itself is optimized with skyline diffusors which makes it rather sound quite neutral (no pics yet).
During attended mastering sessions you can relax on a couch and get the second best sound.

Gear fetish?

So is it true every mastering engineer has a gear fetish?
Absolutely. But almost everyone will tell you that those are just tools. The person who uses them is the most important factor.

My mastering chain will vary for each job but it's usally a mix between software like eg. U-Audio, Voxengo, PSP and analog hardware like the Crane Song STC-8, Crane Song Ibis and Ted Fletcher P38 which is inserted into the chain with use of an U-Audio 2192 AD/DA converter. The end DA converters are Prism Orpheus which is also used for surround mastering. Monitors are custom build ones with Scanspeak drivers. The 5 Scanspeak A4 monitors are powered by Quad amplifiers the 2 Scanspeak Maxima subwoofers are powered by Hypex4 amps.